


Tintin and the Emerald Peril

by Demus



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005), Tintin
Genre: Action/Adventure, Crossover, Gen, Peril
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-12-29
Updated: 2011-12-29
Packaged: 2017-10-28 10:30:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/306937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Demus/pseuds/Demus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hot on the trail of a crooked band of jewel thieves, Tintin and the Captain find themselves in an underground complex in Gibraltar, at the mercy of the gang and their mysterious, otherworldly leader. This time, however, they're not the only ones stumbling headlong into adventure; just who is this stranger who calls himself 'the Doctor'? And why does Snowy like him so much?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tintin and the Emerald Peril

The young man had very polite smile even in the midst of knocking the Doctor to the floor and he called an equally polite “Forgive me, sir!” over his shoulder as he hared away. Unaccustomed to being on the receiving end of such behaviour, it was a good thirty seconds before he managed to get back to his feet, by which time a bearded man in merchant navy gear had come huffing around the corner, waving a crowbar and bellowing “Tintin!” at the top of his lungs.

 

“Exc-” the Doctor managed to say, as the sailor (captain?) dashed past, but the man appeared to be as focused as his fresh-faced quarry and completely ignored him.

 

Well. Following a hot pursuit was always more interesting than almost anything else. The Doctor broke into a run.

 

 

Later, with a pile of groaning thugs all but insensible on the floor and a king's ransom of emeralds successfully retrieved, they found the time for introductions.

 

“My name is Tintin,” the young man said, offering his hand. The Doctor shook it, feeling the firm grip and callused roughness of an adventuring life, as if the banked gleam in his eyes hadn't already given that away. “I'm a journalist.”

 

“I'm the Doctor.”

 

Tintin smiled, apparently unperturbed by the provision of a title rather than a name. That wasn't really surprising; judging by the clothes and the curiously polite, Belgian-accented French, he was one of the early twentieth-century's roving reporters and the two syllables he so casually offered could easily be an alias. The Doctor dug his hands into his pockets, surprised to encounter a rogue sweetie bag in the left one and, fishing in it for a wine gum, nodded in the direction of their captives. “This must be your latest scoop, eh?”

 

Before Tintin could reply, the sea captain let out an impatient snort. He was leaning against the curved wall of the underground cavern, crowbar still clenched in his hands. “Blistering barnacles, just who is this jelly-brained troglodyte?” was what the TARDIS's translation circuits provided after a half-second's hesitation, a rather colourful interpretation that had the Doctor struggling to contain a laugh. “Tintin, have we not got better things to do than nanny this long-shanked lubber?”

 

“Captain!” the journalist admonished, hotly, turning to his friend. “The Doctor hardly needs _nannying_ , he managed to break into this vault with nothing but a blue torch and a magnifying glass!”

 

The captain grumbled, some doubting comment that the Doctor wasn't entirely certain he didn't deserve, and Tintin turned back with an apologetic shrug. “I'm sorry about Captain Haddock,” he said, as the Doctor made a mental note to keep the sonic screwdriver out of sight, “We've had a bit of a hectic day and-”

 

“ _Hectic?_ You call being locked in a crate with a polar bear _hectic_?”

 

“ _And_ ,” Tintin continued, his civil tone becoming decidedly pointed, “I'm afraid we're run a little ragged.”

 

The Doctor grinned; Tintin couldn't have looked less ragged if he'd stepped out of the pages of a fashion magazine. Despite the skirmish, his clothes were as neat as new pins, in stark contrast with the weather-worn attire of his friend. “Running down a gang of underground jewel thieves and fending off wild animals with a crowbar? Not a bad little adventure, that. _And_ you're ginger, some people have all the luck.”

 

To his surprise, Tintin's face fell a little, only a tiny furrow in his brow to acknowledge the oddness of the Doctor's final remark. “Actually, I was hoping there might be more to it. The only unusual thing was the polar bear, there weren't any signs of ancient magic or international conspiracy.”

 

Haddock heaved himself away from the wall with a groan, reaching out to pat Tintin's shoulder in a commiserating fashion. “Chin up, lad, there's talk of civil unrest in South America, maybe one of those lawless lubbers is part of a rogue element.”

 

“No, Captain” Tintin sighed, shaking his head whilst the Doctor gaped at them. “They were just cunning thieves with a sideline in the illegal exotic pet trade.”

 

“Speaking of which,” Haddock said, glancing about them with narrowed eyes, “whatever happened to Snowy?”

 

xxx

 

“He doesn't normally take to strangers so quickly,” Tintin observed, watching Snowy preen and wriggle in the Doctor's lap. The three of them had found the dog in one of the subterranean 'rooms' beyond the main cavern, digging furiously to uncover yet another cache of precious stones, and the captain had been dispatched to find Thomson and Thompson with much grumbling and muttered invective.

 

“It's no wonder, really, I'm fluent in terrier,” the Doctor replied, off-hand, then laughed as the dog rolled onto his back and a hind leg began to kick in time with scratching fingers. Snowy let out an odd noise, somewhere between a growl and a yelp, and the Doctor added, “He wants to know what took you so long.”

 

“Well, getting the captain out of the polar bear's crate was-” Then Tintin's brain caught up with his mouth and he gaped. “You- Do you mean to say that you can communicate with animals?”

 

The Doctor flashed him a grin from beneath a quiff that rivalled Tintin's, mischievous as a boy. “Of course not, that would be ridiculous,” he said, bestowing a final pat to Snowy's belly before shooing him away and bouncing to his feet. “You also need to buy a blue blanket for his bed, he doesn't like the red one.”

 

Snowy, now sniffing at Tintin's dusty knees, let out a single bark and the Doctor's grin widened. “Now, now, there's no need for that sort of language, you'll have me blushing.”

 

Hoping to cover his confusion, Tintin bent to tickle behind Snowy's ears, causing the terrier's stubby tail wag with frantic pleasure. “You don't even sleep in that basket,” he said, just in case. Snowy craned to lick his face.

 

“I suspect it's the principle of the thing. Most dogs have a better eye for interior design than you lot, they think you're all colour-blind,” the Doctor said, sounding a little distracted; looking up, Tintin realised the man had donned a pair of thick-rimmed spectacles and was studying one of the piles of earth that Snowy had created, running it through his fingers with a speculative air. “High percentage of fossiliferous limestone, composed of calcite and,” he dabbed a fingertip onto his tongue, pulling a face at the taste, “dolomite. So, we're in Gibraltar...”

 

Tintin blinked, hands stilling, and Snowy whined a protest. “How- Wait, did you not know that?””

 

“Of course not, I've only just arrived. Oh,” the Doctor snatched the glasses from his face, his mouth tightening with realisation. “I left the TARDIS out there,” this with a wince, then, “I hope no one's impounded it as evidence.”

 

“What's a-”

 

Too late, the Doctor was already hurrying past him, back the way they'd come. Suspicion flared, a dark swoop of unanswered questions ( _a doctor of what, exactly? Was there a name to go with that title? How had he managed to stumble, unknowing, into this subterranean den? Was he unknowing? What, exactly, was that hint of an accent?_ ) but Tintin brushed it aside; if the Doctor was involved with the gang, he'd have been far more worried about the other members recognising him.

 

And if he was involved in some other villainous plot, well, better to keep quiet until he'd found out a little more about the man.

 

Besides, Snowy was an excellent judge of character. Tintin trotted after the newcomer with a lighter heart, the terrier bounding ahead. It didn't take long to catch up with the Doctor, he'd come to a halt near the main entrance to the catacombs, patting something that stood in one of the alcoves. As he approached, Tintin observed that the object appeared to be a pair of blue doors set into the wall topped by an inscription that, whilst written in English, was instantly familiar to anyone who'd had dealings with Interpol.

 

“Oh,” he said, somewhat surprised. “You're with the police, then?”

 

The Doctor appeared to be patting one of the panels with odd tenderness, as if the doors were alive. “Not exactly,” he said with a curious bob of his head, stepping back and revealing the doors to be part of an autonomous structure; a rectangular construction not unlike a narrow shed, topped by a lamp. There was an inscription on one of the panels, densely-packed letters spelling out some monochrome message about public freedom or somesuch, English again and therefore likely to be nonsensical.

 

Tintin filed away the details for future consideration and turned back, perplexed. “But it says 'Police box',” he protested, highly aware of his accented pronunciation; the Doctor spoke such good French, no Saxon flatness, and it was a little galling that he could not return the courtesy.

 

The Doctor shook his head, drawing in a sudden, sharp breath through his nose and holding it for a moment, eyes squinting slightly as if in thought. “Oh, I should never get involved with journalists,” he said, releasing the held breath with a rueful glance at his box. He then fixed Tintin with a look that was equal parts exasperation and amusement. “You'd think Sarah would have taught me that, but no, I always fall in with the curious ones. Still, good to prove an old saying wrong, feline fatalities are comparatively rare in this game. Shouldn't Captain Haddock be back by now?”

 

“Well, he-”

 

“No time for that! _Allons-y!_ ”

 

And with that, the Doctor was off again, a mad whirl of coat and limbs that the young reporter found himself immediately following, with very little idea why he was allowing himself to be swept along in such a fashion. “Where are we going?” he asked, over Snowy's excited yelps.

 

“To wherever your friend is being held!” came the reply, shouted over the Doctor's shoulder with such conviction that Tintin couldn't begin to protest.

 

xxx

 

“Blue blistering-”

 

“That's not going to help, Captain,” Tintin said, mildly, as he curled himself into an awkward pretzel; manoeuvring tightly-bound wrists from behind his back took a fair amount of undignified wriggling, but it was just about manageable if he wasn't distracted.

 

The captain subsided with a grumble. He was looking rather the worse for his run-in with their captors, squinting and wincing under a bruise that was darkening his right temple, though he did seem more irritated than hurt. “I don't see what good that's going to do,” he commented, once Tintin's gyrations were successfully completed. “Front, back, sideways, wherever your hands are, they're still trussed up tighter than a hog in a tie.”

 

Tintin sat up, panting a little from his exertions; the air was thick with dust, seeming to offer barely any oxygen, and they weren't nearly far enough underground to escape the Gibraltan sun's heat. To distract himself from the discomfort, he examined the knots that bound him. “I'm afraid you might be right, there's no way we'll be able to loosen these knots. Is there anything sharp in here?”

 

“Aside from my headache? No. These tunnels must have been hollowed out the same way as the main cavern, it's all compacted dirt.”

 

“And you haven't seen the detectives?”

 

Haddock raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “Those flat-footed bunglers? They couldn't find their own elbows with both hands, a map and a talented anatomist.”

 

Tintin smiled. “At least they haven't been captured, then. Perhaps Snowy will bring them, he ran off before those thugs could grab him.”

 

“No offence, Tintin, but we'll probably be better off if he _doesn't_ find them.”

 

Tintin elected not to reply. The captain let out a little _harrumph_ of triumph and recommenced his struggles against the ropes. Broad shoulders strained beneath the man's dusty jersey, Haddock's bulkier frame a distinct disadvantage when it came to Houdini-esque escapes, and Tintin suppressed a momentary surge of anger at their captors' cowardice. They would have had to have crept up on the captain to subdue him, surprising him with a strike hard enough to bruise and swell in short order; the captain was robust, but he couldn't shrug these things off as easily as Tintin, lacking the twin advantages of youth and steel seemingly grown into his bones.

 

The thought did little for the journalist's famous equanimity.

 

Also weighing on him was the question of the Doctor's disappearance. Tintin, running a couple of strides behind the much taller man, had rounded a corner just in time to see the Doctor collapsing to the ground beneath a heavy blow, a split-second before rough hands descended, pinioning Tintin before he could leap to the other man's defence.

 

He'd been tossed unceremoniously into the captain's cell with the same consideration that might be afforded a sack of coal, all of his protestations falling on deaf ears. Whatever their captors had planned, it wasn't likely to be pleasant. “I do hope the Doctor's all right.”

 

The captain paused in his exertions. “Ah, don't worry, lad,” he said, gruffly. “Anyone whose hair can stand up like yours probably has the same thick skull. I'm sure he's fine.”

 

It was intended to make him smile and it worked, but concern was quick to tug the corners of his mouth down again. “That's not all – they've probably freed those men we managed to take down. I wouldn't be surprised if they were packing up this entire operation, they could leave us here to rot and no one would know.”

 

“Assuming they don't give us a few more whacks to silence us, that is.”

 

Tintin considered this. “You know something, captain? But for this little stunt, I wouldn't have laid money on our captors being murderers. For jewel thieves, they keep a pretty limited armoury, don't you think? Barely a pistol each, and no equipment beyond what an average burglar would have. Not exactly the trademarks of a professional operation.”

 

Haddock raised an eyebrow. “Come on now, lad, they were professional enough to smuggle six million pounds' worth of precious gems right out from under everyone's noses.”

 

“But that doesn't make any sense either!” Tintin protested, doubts that had been nagging at him throughout the whole affair finally beginning to coalesce in his mind. “Dumb luck led us across the water from Spain, but it only took us a day to find their hideout once we'd got here. Didn't you wonder how they could have been so careless, when they'd previously taken every precaution? Besides, why would they even come here? They were speaking Portuguese, not Spanish or English! It just doesn't add up.”

 

“Thundering typhoons, Tintin, they thought they'd got away with it! What thief wouldn't relax a little?”

 

“A thief with the nowse to pull off the biggest emerald heist in history, that's who.”

 

xxx

 

In the darkness, a faint, sickly glow of light, weak and somehow cloying, flickering, diseased. A solitary tentacle, quivering as though under great strain, passed over a pulsing shard of crystal, from which a view of Tintin's cell could be seen. As the image faded in response to the tentacle's movement, a voice broke the new silence, strangled and hissing. “The boy suspects. His intellect is primitive, but cunning. You must dispose of him and his noisy companion.”

 

Knelt before the source of the glow, head bowed in obeisance, the leader of the thieves muttered an acknowledgement, his eyes dull and emotionless in the gloom. “What about the other one, mistress? The alien?”

 

The light throbbed. “Bring him to me when he comes round, and be sure to thoroughly restrain him; he may yet prove useful.”

 

“As you wish, mistress.”

 

xxx

 

Consciousness came, as it always did, with the abrupt suddenness of a Vlaskirt sunrise. The Doctor was upright before he knew it, a bright burst of pain from abused synapses immediately stilling him, and he cautiously opened one eye, wary of light. It was thankfully dim in the ( _stale dusty air, faint reverberations, the burrowing of worms, the press of buried history_ ) underground cell and he opened his other eye, tugging absently at the ropes that bound his hands behind his back; it had been far too long since his last incarceration. Almost an Earth week.

 

“You didn't have to hit me that hard,” he said to the darkness, just in case there was a guard listening. “And I don't think much of your conversation either,” he added, apparently to himself, when no answer was forthcoming.

 

He inspected the claustrophobic confines of his 'cell'; just long enough to lie down stretched to his full length, with a low, arched ceiling, clearly having been hollowed out for short term storage of captives, sealed with nothing more than a big rock. He braced his feet against the stone, felt it give only slightly, and decided there must be some sort of wedge in place to prevent it being moved. It was disappointingly simple. “I don't think a hinge is too much to ask for,” he grumbled, grudgingly admitting to himself a moment later that a proper door would have been redundant, given that the rock was thus far doing a fine job of keeping him imprisoned.

 

Amidst these observations, a thought was nagging him, an old, well-worn concern, worry that he carried close and tried never to be without; where was his human? Where was _(SusanJamieJoSarahTurloughPeriAceRose)_ Tintin? His hands were going numb ( _boring_ ) and his headache ( _boring_ ) pulsed, a dark, insidious ache throbbing from the base of his neck where he'd been struck, and if he wasn't quick to find a way out, he'd be completely incapacitated before he could save anybody. Which just wasn't on.

 

He was distracted from his musings by the low scuffling scratch of claws against dirt and a soft whine; he tilted his head, concentrating, and the scratch became rhythmic, growing deeper and louder. It sounded, in fact, like it was getting closer, and he had just enough time to wrap his addled mind around the concept when a segment of the wall alongside the big rock began to shift, the dirt tumbling as if disturbed, then a dusty _something_ broke through , quickly followed by two equally dusty white paws and the rest of the furiously-digging terrier.

 

Snowy emerged from his tunnel in a shower of earth, tumbling free with a yap, and he bounded to the Doctor's side, tail wagging furiously.

 

“Hello, old son!” the Doctor cried, almost as delighted as the dog, and leaned down to touch noses; Snowy wagged in reply, bouncing up onto his hind legs to sniff at the Doctor's face, disapproval clear in his body language when he scented the blood blossoming in the Time Lord's bruises.

 

“Happens all the time,” he said, to ease the terrier's temper, and Snowy's ears flicked back to show how little he thought of _that_. He dropped back onto all fours and trotted behind the Doctor, warning him with a gruff bark not to move, then there was hot breath on numbing fingers and the dog began to tug at his bindings which, after about half a minute's industrious work, fell to the ground in pieces.

 

The Doctor blinked, rubbing his freed wrists. “Did you just...chew through the ropes?”

 

Snowy barked, tail wagging so hard that his whole back end swayed with it, and the Doctor swept him up with delight. “Whoever said you're better off with a metal dog?” he laughed. “Come on then, boy, let's see if we can't shift this rock. No doubt your master and his friend have got themselves into a right old pickle.”

 


End file.
